Harlequin Superromance September 2014 - Bundle 1 of 2: This Good Man\Promises Under the Peach Tree\Husband by Choice (8 page)

Like last night. However quietly TJ opened his bedroom door, Caleb roused enough to notice. He'd waited to hear either the bathroom door or the toilet flushing, but instead there had been a long silence followed by...a creak. He knew that creak. It was the third step from the top. You couldn't avoid it without skipping the stair altogether. Tensing, he'd waited. Was that the back door? What happened to the squeal?

Wide-awake by then, Caleb had gotten up and peered out the window, but hadn't seen anything. No dark shape slipping around the side of the lodge, no orange glow of fire. He had thought about waking Paula or Roger, but TJ might have had some other reason for wanting to go out. Or maybe he had gone downstairs to the kitchen to get something to eat, or wanted to go online without anyone knowing. Things were bad enough between them already. Caleb wouldn't have admitted it to anyone else, but he was a little bit afraid of TJ, who was older, bigger and meaner than him.

It had to be an hour before he heard the soft sound of the bedroom door across the hall closing again. No squeak on the stairs. He'd remembered to step over that one this time.

Caleb had stayed awake for quite a while longer anyway, expecting...something. He'd seen the square of his window turning lighter before he'd dropped off again.

This morning, the first thing he'd done after going downstairs was to experimentally open the back door. No squeal. Heart pounding, he'd closed it and turned, only to find Roger right behind him.

“Somebody oiled the hinges,” Caleb blurted.

Roger stepped past him and opened and closed it a couple of times. Then he studied the hinges, finally touching them. When he withdrew his hand, Caleb saw the thin streak of fresh oil on his fingertip. His expression when he looked at Caleb was hard.

“You're right. Somebody did.”

Feeling sick, Caleb didn't say anything.

“You knew,” the older man said.

“No, I—” A lump seemed to be jammed down his throat. “I just...opened it.”

“Caleb, if you know something...”

“I don't!” he had yelled. “You think I'm stupid? I
want
to get burned alive?”

Roger had studied his face for a good minute before his jaw flexed and he'd nodded abruptly. “All right, son. Breakfast is on the table.”

Halfway through the meal, Roger had said suddenly, “Thanks to whoever oiled the hinges on the back door.”

Heads jerked up, including Paula's. Watching surreptitiously, Caleb saw only surprise or indifference. TJ had kept eating, his expression flattest of all. Caleb had gone back to his breakfast without looking at TJ again.

Now he wondered if Roger would call Reid and tell him about the door hinges. Whether Reid, too, was beginning to wonder about him, Caleb.

Filled with turmoil, Caleb swung the ax and then again when one of the two pieces remained standing. If TJ was doing all this crap, why hadn't
he
pointed his finger at Caleb?

Right now, everybody probably figured he and TJ were in it together. The fact that they detested each other...they could be faking it. Good theory, he thought bitterly.

He set the ax down and peeled off one of his gloves to inspect his stinging palms. Damn. One of the blisters had burst and it now seeped bloody pus.

“You'd better go put something on that.”

Caleb started. He hadn't heard Diego approaching, but he was right there, looking over his shoulder.

Caleb shrugged and pulled the glove back on. Like a bandage was going to help. Without a word, he grasped another round and set it in place, then reached for the ax. Diego backed up, and Caleb swung.

Thud.

One thing you could say for this wood, he decided. As green as it was, it might not burn even if it was
saturated
with gasoline.

Good thing, since it was being stacked right underneath
his
bedroom window.

CHAPTER FIVE

A
NNA
PUT
ON
her boots while Reid pulled the skis and poles from the cargo space of his SUV and laid the skis flat on the snow. It was Saturday, clear and cold for the last weekend of March. Although the Nordic Center was still open, they'd agreed to try a trail she knew at a higher elevation, in Forest Service land. She'd been glad when they pulled in to see another couple of vehicles ahead of them. Untracked powder could be fun, but the last snowfalls definitely didn't qualify as powder. Slogging through a layer of heavy new snow sounded like hard work.

When they had lunch on Wednesday, she'd suggested this outing. She still didn't know exactly what he wanted from her, but he wanted
something.
Maybe just to be friends. She'd been intending to get her skis out once or twice more before real spring arrived anyway.

Reid's eyebrows had twitched, and then he'd said thoughtfully, “I haven't been in a long time.”

“Do you have equipment?” she'd asked.

“No, but I've been meaning to buy it anyway.” He'd nodded. “I'll do that tomorrow.”

“Should be like riding a bike,” she'd told him and had been shocked by his laugh. Oh lord, what it did to his face.

“Hoping I'll take a dive?” he'd asked, and then she'd laughed, too, because, okay, she might get some secret pleasure from watching Captain Cool floundering in the snow.

Watching now as he stamped into his bindings, tugged a black fleece hat onto his head and gripped his poles, Anna had a suspicion she'd been right in the first place. Skiing was one of those once-learned, never-forgotten skills. She was taking pleasure instead from looking at him. The stretchy, close-fitting pants clung to the long muscles in his legs and outlined a hard butt, presented when he bent to test his binding.

“Ready?” he asked, and she suppressed her sigh.

“Yep.”

The track showed the passing of quite a few skiers before them. Initially, they climbed, using a cross-hatch technique. By the time they topped the rise, Anna's thighs were already feeling the burn and she was almost too warm in her close-fitted SmartWool jacket. Ugh. She hadn't been getting enough exercise. She'd either better start hitting the gym more often or make herself run, miserable weather or no.

Of course, Reid moved fast and effortlessly.
She
would have taken the hill at a slower pace, but pride wouldn't let her lag behind.

Reid stopped at the top, his head turning as he took in the deserted white landscape around them. Above them arched a crystal clear blue sky. Any other skiers were hidden in the trees. From here they had a view north toward Mount Bachelor and the Three Sisters. The surrounding forest was silent, the evergreen branches bowed with a heavy weight of snow.

“Look.” By instinct, Anna kept her voice low. She pointed the tip of her pole toward some animal tracks. Tiny ones.

“Hare, I'll bet.” His face had relaxed amazingly. He inhaled deeply and with obvious delight. “God, it's good not to breathe in smog.”

“Of course, it's probably eighty degrees in L.A.,” she felt compelled to point out. “You could be running on the beach.”

“True,” he said, “but I'd gotten so I hardly ever did. Not like I could afford to live in Newport Beach on a cop's salary.”

“You weren't a surfer.”

His teeth flashed white in another of those rakish grins. “I took it up for a while.” He shrugged. “You get busy, don't make time.”

“Well, I try to keep making time to ski,” she said. “This is more fun than killing myself on the elliptical at the health club.”

“Yeah, it is.” He gestured ahead. “Ladies first.”

“You go first. You weigh more than I do. You'll run me down.”

Besides—she'd rather look at
his
ass than know he was looking at hers.

He chuckled and pushed off, almost immediately bending to decrease wind resistance and go faster. Anna was right behind him, loving the exhilaration of the smooth glide, the rush of chilly air, the absolute silence but for the
shush
of their skis on snow.

They didn't talk much in the next couple of hours, only exchanging brief greetings when they passed two men returning on the same track. With his sharp eyes, Reid spotted some elk huddled beneath the branches of ponderosa pines. A hawk soared above them, searching for unwary hares or rodents.

Eventually they, in turn, decided to go back the way they had come rather than taking what she knew was a longer loop that would eventually return them to the parking lot, but add another couple of hours to the trip. She had an appointment this afternoon for a visit to a potential foster home, and Reid had said he was going to work, too.

During the last long glide to the parking lot, she realized she was tired but also happy, laughing out loud as she skidded to a stop and caught herself on the side panel of his Expedition.

“That was great!” she exclaimed.

He slid more deftly to a stop beside her and grinned. “Yeah, it was.”

A ruddy glow from the cold slashed across his sharp cheekbones. Anna had the sudden, disconcerting realization that his eyes were the same deep green as the pines.

And she was staring.

Flushing—hoping it wouldn't show when her face was probably already red—she bent to get out of her bindings. When she straightened, he hadn't moved. He was watching her, no longer smiling. A couple of lines between his eyebrows had deepened, as if he was disconcerted by something.

He reached out and touched her nose with one gloved finger. “Rudolph.”

Oh, great. Her nose glowed. Well, probably her cheeks, too, but
she
didn't have the same kind of elegant cheekbones.

“I have to be careful,” she heard herself telling him. “My skin doesn't like too much sun, too much cold, most brands of soap or suntan lotion. I either flake or get a rash.”

“It's sensitive.” His voice was low, husky, his eyes intent on her face. “Soft.”

Oh, God. The way he'd said the last word was sexier than a touch. Warmth flooded her, low in her abdomen.

“Anna.”

She couldn't look away from him now. She wanted him to kiss her more than she could remember wanting anything in a long time.

His head bent slowly, either because he was giving her time to retreat or because he himself was hesitant. She quit blinking, only stared into his eyes. And then his lips touched hers. They were cold, but his puff of breath warmed her face.

A sound seemed to vibrate in his chest, and he tilted his head to fit their mouths more closely together. Anna reached out and gripped the sleek fabric of his jacket, her knuckles bumping something hard. Was he carrying a
pistol
under there? How was it she hadn't noticed? But right this second, she couldn't bring herself to care. Her eyes closed and she reveled in the astonishing feel of him nipping at her lips, his tongue stroking the seam until she opened her mouth and let him in. And then it only got better. She wasn't cold anymore. All she felt was the stroke of his tongue, the scrape of his jaw, his big, still-gloved hand kneading her nape, the pressure of his muscled body against hers.

When he finally lifted his head, his eyes burned into hers. Anna was grateful for the bulk of the SUV behind her, given how wobbly her knees were and how jellylike her thigh muscles felt. Although, okay, that might be because of the unaccustomed exercise.

Only then did she hear voices and realize they were no longer alone in the parking lot. He must have stopped kissing her because he heard them first.

“You're carrying a gun,” she blurted.

His lashes veiled his eyes and he let her go. “I usually do,” he said, sidestepping away from her on his skis.

“But...why?”

“Habit.” Face suddenly expressionless, he bent over and released his bindings, picking up his skis and shaking off loose snow.

Anna followed suit while he unlocked the rear of the Expedition. Their equipment stowed inside, he opened the passenger door for her and put a hand under her elbow to help boost her in. She was embarrassed to need the help. She really
was
in decent shape. It was only that her pride hadn't let her suggest they slow down.

He started the engine right away, then unzipped his jacket and stripped off his hat, tossing it onto the backseat. Anna began to shiver, waiting for the icy air coming out of the vents to warm. Unlike him, she wasn't willing to so much as lower the zipper on her coat.

Neither of them said anything. When she sneaked a peek sideways, it was to see him frowning straight ahead through the windshield. Why had her asking about his weapon annoyed him?

Or...was he sorry to have kissed her?

A band closed around her chest. Of course that was it. He didn't want to be attracted to her. She wasn't even sure he wanted to
like
her.

The knowledge felt...right, if unwelcome. Was it something about her? Surely he had friends. He couldn't have reached what had to be his mid-thirties without having a number of lovers. So...what was so wrong about her?

She clasped her still-gloved hands tightly together and bent her head, focusing on them. The silence felt stifling.

The first warmth was seeping into the air when, with her peripheral vision, Anna saw him wrench his gloves off. The movement almost violent, he shoved the gearshift into Reverse. A moment later they were backing in a wide sweep, then following the tracks out of the small trailhead parking lot to the road.

Five minutes passed. Her shivers slowly abated.

“Better?” he asked.

“What?” Her head turned.

“Are you still cold?”

“Oh. No. I just felt chilled for a minute. I'm okay.” Cautiously, she took off one glove, then the other, discovering the interior of the Expedition was warm enough now.

“Good.”

Several more minutes passed.

“Does it bother you, knowing I carry a gun?” he asked abruptly.

She opened her mouth to say an automatic, polite no, but paused to consider. Did it? “No,” she said finally, slowly. “I mean, I know you do on the job. I just didn't realize you had one today until I—”
Touched it.
“And then I wondered why you do.” Before he could answer, she said, “It can't be simply habit. You must think you're going to need it.”

“I don't think that. I've never yet drawn a weapon when I was off the clock.” His frown had deepened, although he didn't look so much irritated as though he was brooding about what he was saying. “I suppose it's occupational paranoia. I've seen so much bad stuff happen to people at unlikely times and places—” His shoulders moved, half shrug, half discomfort. “I want to be ready.”

“Do you keep it beside the bed at night?”

His gaze flicked sidelong. “Yeah.”

“What if, well, you have children? You'd have to lock it up then, wouldn't you?”

“Of course I would.” His jaw seemed to work. “I'm not sure I see myself as a father, though.”

“Because of yours.”

His breath gusted out. “Yeah. You are what you've been taught. You and I both know abused kids become abusers.”

“Some do,” she agreed. “Mostly ones who aren't self-aware. If you know what you
don't
want to be, you can guard against it.”

“Do you actually know anyone who can prove your theory?” He sounded deeply cynical. “From my end, I see nothing but a never-ending cycle.”

“I do know people,” she said quietly. After a moment she lifted her chin. “I know myself.”

He shot a look at her. “You said your mother wasn't abusive.”

Oh, God, why had she opened her big mouth. “She wasn't.”

After a minute, he said, “But someone was.”

“A foster parent.”

She watched him absorb that. “Were you there long?” he asked.

“A year and a half. Although I guess that isn't the same as spending your entire childhood with an abusive parent.”

“How many foster homes did you have?” he asked.

Startled, she met his eyes when he turned his head unexpectedly, his gaze intense. “Um...six, I think. No, maybe seven. Plus a few receiving homes in there.”

“That's lousy.” He sounded angry. “Why so many? Do people just lose interest?”

She could answer this one as a social worker, not as a wounded child. “They do sometimes. Or they move out of state, or they have a baby and don't want a troubled older kid around. Sometimes it's just, well, not a good match. Or the caseworker suspects something is wrong.”

“Like?”

“We had an instance recently where we discovered a woman was denying the foster girl the same quality of food her own daughter was eating. It turned out she hadn't been buying the girl clothes, either. She had one good outfit she had to put on whenever the caseworker was expected. Her drawers were just about empty.”

“The woman was doing it for the money,” he said with disgust.

“Yes. And sometimes we find out kids are being punished inappropriately. The people might lack basic parenting skills, or they didn't understand what they were getting into with kids that came to them with so many problems.”

“You're excusing them,” he said flatly.

“No.” Tension simmered in her, even talking about those instances. She herself had uncovered one especially egregious case of abuse, and after she'd removed the kids from the home and settled them in a temporary shelter, she had gone home herself and fallen to her knees in front of her toilet to throw up. Somehow she'd held in the nausea that long, but she'd had terrible nightmares that night and wondered why she'd chosen an occupation that so often reawakened her worst memories.

Like I had a choice. A vocation, remember?

She could tell Reid was still waiting for an explanation. “Understanding why something happens isn't the same thing as excusing. I
have
to understand why things go wrong if I'm going to weed out applicants who seem enthusiastic but can't be trusted with kids, or place children in the home that will be best for them.”